


Professional Courtesy

by thalia_muse_of_comedy



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Art School, Art Student Victor Nikiforov, M/M, Nude Modeling, Victuuri Big Bang 2017
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-20
Updated: 2017-06-20
Packaged: 2018-11-16 15:53:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11256141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thalia_muse_of_comedy/pseuds/thalia_muse_of_comedy
Summary: When studio arts major Victor Nikiforov encounters Yuuri Katsuki during a life drawing class, Victor has to weigh his professionalism and heart.





	Professional Courtesy

**Author's Note:**

> ha..ha.. haha. Well, here is it. The prompt was given by the wonderfully talented callmekitto on tumblr! Thank you to the admin for putting together this crazy event!
> 
> I'm really nervous about Yuuri's characterization, but what can you do?

   As his closest friend, Chris, fights with the cafeteria spaghetti on a raining Wednesday morning, Victor scrolls lazily through his twitter feed. He slides over brilliant and mediocre art work alike, looking for a video posted by the famous freshman dance major, Yuri Plisetsky.

When he finally finds it, he clicks play and slides it across the table to Chris.

“Watch this, Chris, this kid is crazy good.”

            Chris nods as he chews and lightly wipes his fingers on the napkin on his lap. He takes the phone in his hand and watches a video Victor already has already seen half a dozen times. Mila kept shoving it in his face. She was always stalking dancers on campus.

            Chris’s eyes light up, and Victor knows he’s watching Yuri stretch and stride across the dance floor. Less than a semester into his college career, Yuri Plisetsky is already a hot contender for the male lead of the university’s spring production of Giselle.

            “How old is this kid? How is he so skinny? Do they feed those ballet kids you and Mila stalk,” Chris asks while pausing, rewinding, and rewatching what is probably Yuri’s huge, graceful leap about a minute into the video.

            Victor acts affronted by the accusation of “stalking” ballet dancers, “Chris, you know I have a purely academic and-“

            “’And artistic interest in the ballerinas.’ Yes, my friend, you have told me before. Many times. Mila, on the other hand, is just along for the ride.”

            “She’s what makes me self-conscious about asking Yakov if I can sit in on his dancers’ rehearsals. Completely unprofessional about it,” Victor huffs while snatching his phone out of Chris’s hands. He sets it to the side and folds his hands under his chin. He smiles and bats his eyelashes at Chris.

            “That position tells me you have gossip,” Chris says as he gives up on the spaghetti, pushing the plate to the side. He mimics Victor’s position and commands Victor to “spill.”

            Victor’s smile turns into a fox like grin as he tells Chris, “Mila is making moves on the girl twin musical theater major, Sara Crispino.”

            Chris pretends to clutch pearls he’s not wearing, “Isn’t Sara’s twin brother kind of… attached?”

       Victor excitedly slams his hand on the table, “That’s the thing! He hasn’t put two and two together! He thinks Mila’s just trying to make friends. And Sara totally knows, but she’s being coy. Those girls were totally making eyes at each other the whole rehearsal.”

              Chris has a good laugh at Michele Crispino’s expense.

As Chris wipes a tear from under his round glasses, a voice rings out in the dingy cafeteria, “Chris!”

            Chris starts and curses when his finger smudges his lens. He waves at a spot behind Victor’s right shoulder, so Victor turns his head to look at the approaching person. He sees semi-familiar young man with warm, tan skin and winged eye liner make-up gurus would kill for. The not-stranger holds the expensive digital camera hanging from a strap around his neck and half-jogs over to their table.

            “Phichit,” Chris gives a name to the familiar face, “don’t see you in the cafeteria much, what brings you here?”

            Phichit shrugs and holds out his camera as an answer before saying, “would you believe me if I told you I was working on a project where I photograph the weird shit people do to food they are scared to eat?”

            “What the fuck,” both Victor and Chris say at the same time.

Phichit giggles and continues, “I’ve seen the weirdest food sculptures today.”

            All three of them laugh. Victor, a senior, sighs and says, “art school” as if it was the catch-all answer to every phenomenon on campus.

            “Art school.” Chris repeats, a senior as well.

Phichit gives an excited nod and snaps a pic of the ketchup leg Victor drew on his plate with a French fry earlier. “Just when you think you’ve seen it all,” he finishes.

            He gently positions the camera back to hanging off the strap. His phone buzzes. Phichit apologizes and checks his phone, pocketing it almost immediately. “Anxious roommate,” he explains.

Victor and Chris nod in understanding.

            “Chris, you’re taking the upper division Figure Drawing this semester, yeah?” Phichit asks, shifting uncomfortably.

“I am.”

Victor perks up, “I’m in that class, too!”

   “Oh! I thought so,” Phichit looks relieved. “I was wondering,” he continues, “ah- my roommate… he’s your model tomorrow…”

            Victor taps in chin in interest. “And he’s nervous, isn’t he? Chris was nervous when he modeled last week.”

 Chris points a finger at Victor, “You know I have never been nervous when it comes to nudity.”

            “You like being sexy,” Victor points out, “posing for figure drawing isn’t sexy. It’s tough work.”

  Phichit makes a distressed noise, “Is it really hard? My roommate’s freaking.”

Chris shakes his head, “please tell your roommate not to worry. The students will be too busy trying to draw the correct slope of his shoulders to be really processing that he’s completely nude.”

            Victor nods and drums his fingers on the desk. He drifts from the conversation to check his phone. A forgotten reminder to buy new charcoals and sketching pencils at the locally owned art and craft supply store.

            “Crap, I’ve gotta run down the street to Marty’s. Chris, angel from on high, please tell me you’ve got the keys to the car,” he begs Chris.

            “Yeah, let me grab them.”

As Chris rummages around in his satchel, Victor exchanges pleasantries with Phichit.

            “Sorry I didn’t actually introduce myself, I’m Victor Nikforov, senior studio arts major.”

Phichit offers his hand to Victor, “Phichit Chulanont, sophomore photography major.”

            “I think I’ve seen you around.”

“Do you hang out around the dance building a lot?” Phichit asks with a quirked eyebrow.

            Victor gives a self-deprecating hum, “Yeah, my senior thesis revolves around exploring movement and light, with dancers as my main focus. I think they bend space and light around them with their movements.”

           He’s excited, but embarrassed. Famous artists before him have studied dancers; he wasn’t doing anything really original.

Chris hands Victor the keys to his old sedan. “Please be back before Art History. If you don’t show, I’m gonna fall asleep,” Chris insists.

         Victor waves his fingers as a goodbye to Chris and Phichit, “I’ll be back. We can’t afford to fail that class… again.”

Chris gives him a laugh that conveys how college has made him dead inside.

 

 

        Thursday morning finds Victor setting up his easel, wiping the sleep from his eyes while his fingers are still clean. The rest of the upperclassmen (and Mila, a freshman) make their way into the studio with their giant art bags in tow.

Chris saunters over and and steals a shading pencil out of Victor’s set.

“I can see you perfectly fine, you could just ask to borrow it,” Victor is not feeling friendly.

            “Okay, can I borrow one of your pencils since I am too tired to run back to the car?”

“You can’t even say please, Chris?”

            “Please Chris?”

“All the gods above and below, fine just take,” Victor throws up his hands in surrender.

      Chris thanks him and wanders back over to his own easel.

     Victor sits down to shove everything he does not want covered in graphite and charcoal into his backpack. When he’s finished, he sees who he assumes to be the new model speaking with the professor. Victor tries to get a feel for his build and features, but all he sees is black hair and squared shoulders.

            The model clenches his hands; he starts to bow, but thinks better of it. The professor leads him to the area they have partitioned off for him to change.

            Victor calls out to Chris on his far right, “Did you get a good look at him?”

Chris stops sharpening the pencil in his hand, “I think I’ve seen him around campus a little. Phichit told me his name… Yuuri.”

            “Chris, that’s not Yuri. You just watched a video of the kid.”

“No, I know the difference.”

     Mila butts into the conversation as she is wont to do, “Yuuri Katsuki. He’s a dance major, too.”

            “I met his roommate yesterday. Strange to think there are dance majors I don’t know,” Victor turns to her behind him and shrugs his shoulders.

“He’s not in the ballet classes, so it’s not like you’d care,” Mila teases.

            “Phichit was telling me he’s studying here from Japan,” Chris offers.

Mila stretches her long arms and says, “explains the aborted bow.”

            “Someone aborted a cow?” Georgi Popovich a few seats to left.

“Stop eavesdropping if you’re not going to be good at it, Georgi,” Mila warns, flicking a piece of eraser at him.

            “Well, now that I have been invited into this conversation, does anyone have any black acrylic paint I can borrow for Painting IV,” Georgi puts his hands together to plead with the class.

      “Maybe you should try not using so much black? Is there no joy in your work,” Chris tries.

            “No, only black can truly capture the sorrow in my heart,” Georgi replies.

“Dude,” Mila starts, “that’s what you get for going out with one of our models. You know it never works out.”

            Georgi hangs his head and says, “I wanted to believe in our love.”

“That wasn’t love,” Victor assures him, “You saw her naked a few times and she liked your eyeliner. But, I am sorry it didn’t work out.”

            Georgi nods, but doesn’t respond.

Victor rises to comfort Georgi, resting a hand on his shoulder. “I suppose this is a lesson in professionalism, though. She’s a great model, I hope she chooses to work with us again sometime.”

            Georgi makes a pained noise, and Victor returns to his seat. He watches the rest of the class settle in as the professor comes to the center of the room. The professor examines the seat set out for Yuuri before addressing the class.

      “Our model today,” he begins, “is very shy. I hope you all, as my upper division students…”

            “And Mila,” someone behind Victor yells.

“Yes and Mila. I expect you to make our model feel welcome.”

            There’s a chorus of yes’s and a few students nod their heads.

Victor watches the door to the studio open as Yuuri Katsuki slips in wearing just a short robe. Yuuri’s movements are fluid, but his hands might be shaking if the warm light of the studio are not playing tricks on Victor’s eyes.

            As Yuuri stands beside the professor in the center of the room, the professor gives him a smile and shows Yuuri where he can leave the robe.

            Yuuri removes his robe. Victor’s eyes are drawn immediately to the cinch of Yuuri’s waist. His figure is nearly impossible. Yuuri’s shoulders and chest are average, but Victor has never seen another man with such a perfect hourglass curve to his body.

            Yuuri askes the professor what he should do.

“For the first pose, we’ll have you just sit in the chair; do whatever you want with your hands. Please keep as still as possible. We’d like for you to hold that pose for five minutes. Then, you can stretch for one.”

            “Thank you for having me,” Yuuri responds, looking at the tiled floor.

Victor watches the red of his lips form around the words, knowing the exact shade of red he would use if Yuuri was in one of his paintings.

            “Thank you for coming,” Victor finds himself saying without thinking about it.

Yuuri looks up from the floor he had been staring at to meet Victor’s eyes. He gives Victor a soft, unsure smile and a nod of his head. As the professor starts the timer for Yuuri, Victor stares at Yuuri and his sketch pad. He tries to remember how exactly Yuuri’s face shifted for the smile. He picks up a pencil, but he fails to capture the exact tilt of Yuuri’s mouth.

            Through the next three poses, Yuuri fluctuates between being stiff and silent and bordering on fidgety. Victor can feel the slight agitation of his classmates when Yuuri moves push his glasses back up his nose for the fifth time. A minute later, he thinks Georgi snaps one of his charcoals when Yuuri runs his hand through his thick black hair.

            Victor takes a look around the classroom, eventually meeting Chris’s glance. Chris waggles his eyebrows in the universal ‘fix this’ silent gesture.

            Victor emphatically shakes his head no, but now Mila is coughing the ‘please someone make this kid settle down’ cough.

            Making sure everyone paying attention understands how much he does not want to talk to the model, he looks up towards the heavens dramatically. He puts down the piece of charcoal he had been shading Yuuri’s hair with and pushes his own platinum hair away from his eyes.

      “So, ah, Yuuri, I met your roommate, Phichit, yesterday. He told me and Chris you’re a dance major?” Victor askes.

            Yuuri unglues his eyes from the wall behind the art students and makes brief eye contact with Victor. He nods and returns to his thousand-yard stare.

     “If you don’t mind us asking, what’s your focus? Mila and I know a lot of the ballet students, but we’ve never seen you around.”

            Yuuri looks at Victor again and tries to hide a laugh.

“There’s charcoal on my face isn’t there?”

            Startled, Yuuri shakes his hands in front of him repeating “no” several times.

“I’m sorry for laughing, so does that make you _that_ art major? You’re Victor?”

            “Guilty as charged. Do I have some strange reputation in your department?”

Mila and Chris giggle behind their hands and smear graphite and charcoal all over their mouths.

            “Perhaps they think you are a creepy stalker,” Mila offers.

“No, I’m pretty sure that’s you, Mila,” Victor shoots back.

            Yuuri’s timer goes off. He slowly stands to stretch, giving his arms a little wave.

“The freshman Yuri doesn’t particularly like that you’re always at the ballet rehearsals, or so I hear,” Yuuri nervously wipes his forehead before looking to the professor for the next pose.

     Instead of letting the professor speaks, Victor interjects, “but you didn’t answer: what kind of dance you do do?”

            “Oh, I do a lot of hip-hop and world dance,” Yuuri answers, his voice small and uncertain.

     Mila stands up from her workstation yelling, “Can you stand on your head?”

Yuuri offers her an embarrassed smile and nods.

            Victor slaps his thigh in revelation and asks, “How long do you think you could hold it?”

The artists surrounding Yuuri start to murmur with excitement.

            Yuuri looks up to the ceiling, calculating his strength, before responding, “probably close to a minute and a half.”

 As soon as the words leave his mouth, the classroom erupts into a cacophony of crazy artists begging Yuuri and the professor to allow the pose.

            The professor hushes them after a moment, but turns to Yuuri saying, “it sounds like a difficult pose, but it’s not everyday we get such an opportunity. If you’re willing, Yuuri, we’d appreciate it a lot.”

        Victor yells out a “please” which is followed by a chorus of other pleas.

      In that moment, Victor sees a switch inside Yuuri flip. Yuuri squares himself, and it is as if his entire center of gravity shifts. He stands taller. Seems more sure of himself despite his nakedness.

            The small smile he had had since Mila called out to him turns into a performer’s grin.

“Yes,” he agrees, “I’ll do it.”

Georgi leaps out of his seat, “do you want a mat or something better than the floor?”

            Yuuri shakes his head, “no, thank you.”

“Are you sure?” Chris offers, wanting Yuuri to acquiesce.

            “He’s sure.” Victor assures his classmates.

Yuuri looks at Victor for the first time since the shift in the atmosphere. The corners of Yuuri’s mouth are sharp like steel and the look in his eyes slice through Victor. The fire inside Yuuri stirs Victor’s heart, making his hands itch to capture feeling.

       The artists fix themselves after the uproar, and Yuuri takes the few moments to stretch better. He rolls his neck and shoulders. He waves his fingers in small arcs and uses his hands to help stretch out his arms and legs.

       Victor stares at those fingers, telling himself his fascination is purely artistic in its nature. Yuuri’s only stretching, but Victor can already hear the music his body creates.

            Victor grabs one of his thinner pencils and sharpens it with the knife Chris gave him as an apology for stepping on some of Victor’s oil paints last semester. When he’s finished, he looks up to find Yuuri watching him as he waits.

            The professor asks Yuuri, “are you ready?”

Victor and Yuuri, still watching each other both respond with a loud, “yes!”

            When Yuuri turns himself upside down, Victor feels like his world flips with him.

 

        The next day, Victor walks through the sleet with an umbrella and Chris shielding him from the weather. With each passing day, the crisp fall temperatures plummeted closer to winter’s freeze.

     “Chris, you better be starting the car everyday, I don’t care if you don’t have money for gas. If that monstrosity gives out on us, I’ll never forgive you,” Victor warns Chris as they pass the car sitting sadly in the parking lot.

            “Don’t worry, Victor. Despite how ugly it is; I do love the car we bought. It is our child! I won’t kill our offspring,” Chris assures him.

Victor makes a pinched expression, “I’m never having children with you, Chris. Though they would be beautiful.”

       He hip checks Chris out from under the umbrella saying, “Oh Chris they would be beautiful! Maybe just one! For science and artistic purposes.”

       Chris laughs and bends down to scoop up the almost snow to throw it at Victor. He hits Victor in the stomach, making Victor glad for his many layers.

“This isn’t how I want us to have our children! I want them to be born from love! Not your twisted artist impulses!”

     “Then we shall never have children. I am a professional, Chris. I will not let infatuation and my art mix,” Victor states as he allows Chris back under the umbrella.

“You say that now, but don’t think the rest of the classroom did not feel you and Yuuri having eye sex.”

       Victor stops walking and Chris is left out in the cold again.

“Maintaining eye contact with someone is not sex. I think the two of us were appreciating each other… artistically,” Victor assures him.

            “Ah yes, and it is for your artistic purposes that you asked him for his rehearsal schedule for next week. Because hip hop is now suddenly something you want to observe.”

      “He does world dance, too! He probably looks stunning in dance attire from around the globe! Phichit sure is lucky to have such an artist as his roommate.”

            “You can try to convince yourself and me all you like, but I think you have a crush on this dancer,” Chris observes.

    Before Victor can answer, a large group of what can only be freshmen plough through the walkway, knocking Victor and Chris apart. Once the storm passes, Victor closes the umbrella in defeat. There was no point in trying to stay dry now that both Chris and he were already soaked.

            “That’s what we get for walking in front of the freshmen hall,” Victor chides.

“I think you summoned that flock to avoid this conversation,” Chris says, amazed, “You can’t run, Victor. You should embrace this opportunity.”

            “While Yuuri is our model, I will not be making any advances. Perhaps I will never make advances on him. I want to draw him more. Maybe even paint him, but I can’t do that if we get involved and then uninvolved. I will not sacrifice my art for a fling, “Victor stands firm on his code of ethics.

            The pair walks in silence as they approach the cafeteria. Two bundles of human beings exit the cafeteria building and come onto the same path as Chris and Victor.

            “Fine, harden your heart to this premonition of love, but I hope you go to his hip-hop rehearsal on Saturday. It seems like a good opportunity to see a different type of movement,” Chris urges.

            “Yes, I’m going Yuuri’s rehearsal. Without Mila. I don’t need her traumatizing a whole new set of dancers,” Victor assures Chris as the other travelers pass them.

            The shorter member of the bundled travelers removes his scarf from his face to call back to Chris and Victor, “He would really like that!”

            The taller traveler shrieks and hip checks his friend so hard he falls into the bushes.

“I think that’s Phichit and Yuuri,” Chris tells Victor as he opens the cafeteria door.

Phichit laughs and returns to Yuuri’s side wrapping an arm over his shoulders. He whispers something Victor cannot hear into Yuuri’s pink ears. Yuuri nods, mumbling close to “mind your own business” before waving to Victor.

            “I’ll see you tomorrow, Victor,” Yuuri calls out before Victor enters the cafeteria.

“I’ll see you then, Yuuri!”

 

        8 o’clock in the morning is too early for Victor to be up, but he does it for his art. He does it for his new artistic fascination. He does not do it because he has a crush on said artistic fascination. Even if he did have a crush on Yuuri Katsuki, nothing good could come of it. Just look at Georgi during class as he sobs into one of his blackened paint rags.

       Determined to _not_ flirt with Yuuri, Victor enters the small dance studio where the hip-hop dancers are warming up for their four-hour rehearsal.

            Yuuri is on the floor, grabbing his feet as stern faced fellow dancer pushes on his back. They hold the position for a moment before Yuuri gives the okay. The other dancer helps him to his feet. Yuuri claps him on the shoulder. When he spots Victor by the door, he waves and tells his friend, “thanks, Otabek.”

            Otabek looks at Victor then back to Yuuri. “You’re welcome,” he says before walking over to a sullen Yuri Plisetsky.

The younger Yuri bombards Otabek with questions about the latter’s own stretching, making sure his friend doesn’t pull anything.

     “Yes, Yura, I’m fine. Now please, go to your own rehearsal before Yakov kicks my ass,” Otabek asks.

            “Fine,” Yuri tells him as he turns to leave, “Who taught you talk like that? You used to be such a gentleman.”

     “Your presence corrupted me, you demon fairy,” Otabek shoots back.

“Okay, fine. Bye,” Yuri finally passed Victor by the door. Seeing Victor, Yuri leans on the door jamb, tall and thin. He frowns at Victor.

            “You’re that creep artist that stalks the ballerinas, yeah?”

Victor nods.

            Yuri scoffs and says, “And now you’re moving onto the hip-hop losers. Do whatever you want, just leave the giantess at home next time you sit in on _my_ practices, yeah?”

            “ _Goodbye_ , Yuri,” both Otabek and Yuuri say to verbally push Yuri out the door.

Yuri finally leaves with a wave of a hand. Yuuri Katsuki breathes a sigh of relief and Otabek digs through his bag for his towel.

      “Victor, it’s nice to see you again,” Yuuri offers him a smile, “sorry you had to see the diva himself while he’s in one of his moods.”

            Victor and Yuuri lean against the wall by the door as more dancers begin to trickle in.

“To be honest,” Victor begins, “that’s the first time I’ve ever spoken with him without Yakov as a leash. He seems like a handful on and off the stage.”

          Yuuri’s face scrunches nervously, marring his smile, “he’s very talented. He’s still young, so I think there will be plenty of people who tell him no and such. I don’t think it needs to be one of us.”

        Victor watches as Yuuri looks around the room, his expression soft as he watches his fellow dancers. “I can’t tell if those are words from the wise or from an old man that doesn’t want any confrontation,” Victor muses.

         Yuuri’s eyes shoot back up to Victor. His eyes narrow as he says, “I think you’re older than me. And perhaps going bald. Maybe you’re the old man; I’m not afraid of confrontation.”

            Shocked, Victor’s hands shoot up to his hair. He feels around his scalp for a moment before stopping.

    Yuuri tries and fails to stifle a laugh, “I’m sorry, you’re not going bald. And if you’re an old man, you’re a handsome one at least.”

        Yuuri seems to be surprised by his own words. The jovial mood he had been projecting fades away. Yuuri looks away from Victor, fidgeting with the hem of his shirt. He pushes up his glasses as they fall down his downturned face.

       Before Victor can respond, Yuuri pushes off the wall to join his fellow dancers.

Victor settles himself by the dancers’ bags. He feels far enough away as to not be a hindrance, but close enough to be able to see the details.

      He’s come to this rehearsal to focus on sketching the fluidity of Yuuri’s movements. To him, there’s a great difference between the style of movement between ballet and more contemporary forms of dance. He loves the disciplined stretches and leaps, cutting through the room like a sharp wind. Yet, as he continues to watch Yuuri move to the rhythm, he discovers a love for the fire in Yuuri’s dancing. Sometimes smooth and soft like silk, sometimes edging on erratic or even manic, Yuuri enthralls Victor.

      Instead of bending the light, Yuuri seems to absorb the light, become it. The dancers use the entire floor as their playground, making the space seem larger than it is.

     The small sketchbook in his hand is nearly forgotten as Yuuri and his classmates slowly crawl on the floor, stretching catlike with every beat. Victor watches Yuuri’s hands as the meet the wooden floor of the studio.

      Inspired, Victor tries to sketch Yuuri’s fingers in an attempt to capture the dichotomy between delicate and forceful, but Yuuri’s moving to fast. Victor can’t get a clear picture in his mind or in person to be able to draw the way he wants.

    90 minutes in, the instructor calls for a long break, telling everyone to be back in 15 minutes. Victor stands up from the pile of bags when Yuuri approaches him.

“You’re very good,” Victor compliments Yuuri. Instead of taking the compliment, Yuuri scrunches his nose.

       “You watch the ballet classes mostly, don’t you,” Yuuri asks.

            Victor nods.

“Then, you’re not used to watching hip-hop,” Yuuri decides, “I’m actually pretty bland.”

      Yuuri’s face is flushed from the practice. He bends down to claw through his bag for his water bottle. Victor joins him near the ground.

“I don’t think you’re bland. You wouldn’t be here if you were,” Victor tries assuring Yuuri, but the practice of comforting people is foreign to Victor.

     Yuuri sighs and chugs his water bottle to avoid responding. Victor waits for a response as he finishes.

“Look over there, by the barre,” Yuuri gestures to the man who helped him stretch earlier, “Otabek Altin. He’s younger than most of the people in this class. Better than us, too. Which is great. Always good to have real talent around.”

     Yuuri stands and continues, “ _He’s_ good. I’m just a dime a dozen back up dancer.”

Victor stands, too, and crosses his arms, “If you keep talking about yourself like that, maybe you will be a ‘dime a dozen back up dancer.’ But, I think the work you put in could put you miles above that.”

      The blush on Yuuri’s face reaches all the way to his ears. Victor finds it adorable, even if he is frustrated at his new acquaintance. Yuuri fidgets with the bottle and steals glances at Victor for the next few minutes.

       Tired of the silence, Victor speaks, “Seeing you on the dance floor, and it happened when you did some of your own poses for us, too. You seem like a different person. I’d never believe someone if they pointed at you on stage and ‘that man there is insecure.’”

        Yuuri decides to put his water bottle away. Crouching again, this time with his back to Victor, he responds, “I grew up dancing. From since I can remember. I’ve always loved it. I feel more comfortable onstage than in real life. I’m sure plenty of people feel like that.”

         “I think it’s the same for many artists, yes,” Victor agrees. He moves to stand in front of Yuuri and holds out his hand as an offer to help him stand.

   Yuuri takes his hand and thanks Victor. When they let go, Yuuri askes Victor if he got the sketches he wanted.

            “For the most part,” Victor starts, “The differences of the movements in ballet and hip-hop… I still don’t know how to convey it, but it’s beautiful.”

            “I’m sensing a ‘but’ coming up,” Yuuri raises an eyebrow.

Victor feels himself flush now, too. His newfound fascination with Yuuri’s hands feels more intimate than the overall fluidity of his body.

            Nervously, he stammers out, “We should get coffee sometime!”

Yuuri takes a surprised breathe and responds, “I would like that very mu-“

    “So I can draw your hands! I mean,” Victor interrupts him, digging through his own bag for a pen; and to distract himself.

            “We can have coffee,” Yuuri assures him, “for whatever reasons.”

“I’m glad you are amenable to the idea,” Victor feels frazzled as he continues to dig for a pen. “But I assure it is for artistic purposes. You have very beautiful hands. And, you know, hands are very difficult to draw so a setting like a coffeeshop-“

 Yuuri allows himself a short, small laugh before asking, “Are you trying to convince me of your intentions, or yourself?”

     Victor stops digging through his bag to look at Yuuri.

Yuuri’s smile is softer than his stage persona’s. Victor wants to paint that smile, too.

   “Victor?”

       “Yes?”

   “What were you looking for?”

_You,_ Victor thinks. Instead he says, “a pen.” 

       Yuuri shakes his head and rolls his eyes. He takes a step towards Victor. Slowly reach his hand as if to cup Victor’s face, Yuuri slides the pen from Victor’s ear.

     “I assume you have some paper?” Yuuri waves the pen in front of Victor.

“Maybe,” Victor begins, “I should give you my number… I might loose yours.”

     “Or,” Yuuri counters, “we can act like people from this century, and I’ll put my number into your phone.”  He slides the pen into the front pocket of Victor’s shirt, rolling his eyes again.

   “I like the way you think, Yuuri,” Victor admits, taking his phone from his pockets and unlocking it for Yuuri.

 Yuuri quickly types his information into the phone. As he hands it back, Yuuri’s stage smile comes back to play.

    “You know what I think?”

                “What?”

    “I think you like more than that,” Yuuri responds, walking back to the dance floor with a light wave goodbye. Victor watches as the fingers he can’t wait to draw dance away from him.

For the first time, Victor wonders if perhaps something good can come from mixing work and play.

 


End file.
